Please help me save my last turkey

I know this probably belongs in the disease section, but it only seems to be affecting my turkeys. If a moderator thinks this would be better off in that forum sub-section, feel free to move it.

Out of four turkeys I purchased this spring ( a BB Bronze, 2 Bourbon Reds, and a Royal Palm), three have died of the same symptoms. The BBB and one of the Boubons died in the beginning of July, the Palm just died half an hour ago.

The symptoms are as follows: Turkey starts defecating a yellow, wet diarrhea. Bird becomes listless, starts losing its balance, then its ability to walk, and finally dies suddenly of a heart attack. The BBB had symptoms for four days before death; the Bourbon, two.

The Palm showed no symptoms this morning when let out, and been acting normally yesterday. My dad found him laying in the ditch that runs along the property and hour and a half ago. Now he's dead. Bird showed additional symptoms after he died - there was a thick, tannish mucus coming out of his mouth, and he had rigor mortis within 15 minutes of dying.

Note: These are the only symptoms these turkeys have had. There has been no change in their appearance or the color of their skin after getting sick and dying, and all were perfectly happy and healthy before showing symptoms. I also have chickens and ducks, all free range, and there have been wild turkeys living in this area for the last thirty years, and have been frequent backyard visitors. I also live in Michigan, and just like a lot of people in the U.S., we've been having hot, humid weather. One more thing: there is a CAFO dairy farm across the road from us that shares the same ditchline.

For the first two birds, I thought they had mild coccidosis that had been made more vicious by the 100+ F humidity heat index temperatures that hit us in early July. The sick birds were given treatment doses of Corid; the rest of the birds were given exposures doses of the same in their drinking water for the following four weeks. The Corid didn't do anything for the sick turkeys, and it obviously didn't help the Palm.

What else could be affecting them? Something they ate? Drank? What?

I don't want to lose the the last of my sweethearts to whatever this insidious thing is.

Blackhead is one of the critical diseases of growing turkeys and game birds
It is carried by an intestinal parasite and the symptoms are:- loss of condition, drowsy appearance, ruffled feathers, and diarrhoea, sometimes mixed with blood.
It may cause stunted growth, poor feed utilization and death.

Symptoms
Birds develop foamy yellow diarrhoea and sit huddled up
They appear depressed and ill
They stop eating and get very thin
Increased thirst
Droopiness
Drowsiness
Darkening of the facial region
The birds can be so ill, that their wattle and comb goes blue (thus the name blackhead)
If not treated the birds usually die
Any sulphur coloured foamy droppings should be considered as blackhead, even if the bird is not showing any other signs of the disease
Blackhead acts as an immune suppressor, which will allow other diseases to have greater effect on your bird's health
It may cause stunted growth, poor feed utilization and then death

Thank you so far. I've been searching through the forums, and if it is blackhead, then a worming regimen is in order. I was going to do it next month, but I already have the stuff, so I put piperazine in all their water dishes and added Safe-Guard multi-species pellets (1 teaspoon ground up with a make-shift mortar/pestle) to their feed.

It could be blackhead, but none of the turkeys heads changed color, and they died so very fast. I've never had a chicken with blackhead or coccidosis, and all but one of my chickens were bought as chicks. Also, we've had wild turkeys around for years, so it seems unlikely that it was prevalent around here before I got chickens two years ago.

I also read on the forums that yellow poop is a sign of liver trauma, so toxicity could be a cause, too.

I'm going to try and get some fishzole (metronidazide) ASAP, but if the Bourbon drops as fast as the Palm, it really won't matter.

Heads don't turn `black' (if they live long enough circulation/secondary bacterial infection can cause skin to darken). Checking the liver for the lesions (pic in thread linked to above), and for cecal cores would result in a possibly more accurate dx. Valbazen is a full spectrum wormer that you might look into.

It could be palerium-typhoid. Everytime before i go to county fair
we have to get our birds palerium tested, and that could be it.
Have your birds tested by that from your local bird veterinarian
(even if he/she does exotic birds) but I heard that palerium
can make all of your birds drop

when you dispose of the creatures make
sure you burn the body in a barrel
or a secluded area where no one and
no thing goes that way it won't spread.
Because if you bury it, it can infect later on birds

Thank you so far. I've been searching through the forums, and if it is blackhead, then a worming regimen is in order. I was going to do it next month, but I already have the stuff, so I put piperazine in all their water dishes and added Safe-Guard multi-species pellets (1 teaspoon ground up with a make-shift mortar/pestle) to their feed.

It could be blackhead, but none of the turkeys heads changed color, and they died so very fast. I've never had a chicken with blackhead or coccidosis, and all but one of my chickens were bought as chicks. Also, we've had wild turkeys around for years, so it seems unlikely that it was prevalent around here before I got chickens two years ago.

I also read on the forums that yellow poop is a sign of liver trauma, so toxicity could be a cause, too.

I'm going to try and get some fishzole (metronidazide) ASAP, but if the Bourbon drops as fast as the Palm, it really won't matter.

I just saw this post and was wondering if you ever checked the livers in your turkeys as ivan3 suggested? Blackhead was my first thought too and I think this year I have seen more cases of it here than ever. Maybe the wierd weather is making it show up more? A lot of the info that I learned about Histomoniasis came from the Michigan DNR http://www.michigan.gov/dnr/0,4570,7-153-10370_12150_12220-26481--,00.html and it has shown up occasionally there. Chickens can carry the protozoa but not show symptoms so you can't really say for sure that they never had it. It could very well have come in with the wild turkeys, and they could be more resistant.

The additional symptoms are a bit troubling, though it's possible that the mucus was a secondary infection? Anytime a birds immune system is stressed fighting an illness there is a chance of secondary infections setting in such as e-coli. The same is actually true of people too which is why they sometimes give you antibiotics when you have a virus. Antibiotics do nothing for virus but they are trying to stop any bacterial secondary infections.

Good luck with your remaining poult, I hope it is still with you and healthy!​